Bluebasser86

Welcome!

Pretty standard KS winter around here. 10 Actual Temp 21° Lo 2° Hist. Avg. 38° Lo 20° Yesterday 11 Hist. Avg. 38° Lo 20° Today 12 Partly sunny and colder 29° Lo 20° Hist. Avg. 38° Lo 20° 13 Milder with plenty of sun 46° Lo 32° Hist. Avg. 38° Lo 20° 14 Sunny 52° Lo 34° Hist. Avg. 38° Lo 20° 15 A bit of snow and rain 37° Lo 19° Hist. Avg. 38° Lo 20° 16 Partly sunny and colder 25° Lo 13° Hist. Avg. 38° Lo 20° 17 Cold with some sun 28° Lo 13° Hist. Avg. 38° Lo 20° 18 Snow or flurries possible 29° Lo 18° Hist. Avg. 39° Lo 20° 19 Variable clouds with flurries 35° Lo 25° Hist. Avg. 39° Lo 20° 20 Increasing clouds 37° Lo 26° Hist. Avg. 39° Lo 20° 21 Cloudy 37° Lo 17° Hist. Avg. 39° Lo 20° 22 Partial sunshine 38° Lo 16° Hist. Avg. 39° Lo 20°

Never seen the point in fluoro for cranking unless you just want to get every inch of depth possible. 10lb Big Game for deep to mid depth baits, 15lb for squarebills. If a fish breaks you off with that stuff, they earned it.

Only reason they would get beat up is if you're beating them up.

Indiana has some good powerplant lakes I believe. That's probably the only chance you'll have to see open water until you get far enough south that you might as well drive to Texas or Florida. There's some open water here in KS but driving several hours to maybe see open water and having the even slimmer chance of catching a fish from it isn't really worth it IMO. There's powerpant lakes here too, but again, might as well just go all the way to Texas at that point.

Hardest hits you'll ever get in freshwater fishing, wipers and stripers on an A-rig.

Reinforced kick plates. Does the save thing as that bar without drilling 2 big holes in your wall. If a person has any idea how to kick a door in, most deadbolts aren't even going to slow them down. If you really want to go all out, you can get the reinforced door jam as well. I'm with A-Jay though. I have a dog that warns me as soon as someone pulls up in front of the house and enough firepower to keep a small army at bay long enough for backup to get there. Some criminals don't realize that the lock on the door isn't always to protect the occupants from the criminals...

It was 40 (for a high), and raining on me last Thursday. Lake was about a foot high and stained from all the rain we've had. Still managed to catch a couple bass along with several whites and wipers and a few catfish. If you want to go bad enough, you'll go.

5 pages of Minnesota reports here. It's slowed down due to hard water, but if you help keep it alive by posting questions and reports, you'll have more and more people see it at the top of the page and chiming in. The KC area thread was almost dead a couple different times, now there's over 300 pages.

Agreed. Teams getting to transition from Farve to Rodgers or Bledsoe to Brady is very rare.

I fish a Savage Gear Glide Swimmer with a fast or slow straight retrieve right on or just below the surface and it kills the smallmouth at times. Comes in big sizes that should appeal to the grande bass he'll be targeting.

I would say that 20 is probably a stretch if you're saying 20 NFL starter quality QB's.

I can't let my emotions get the best of me, I'll be out of a job (and probably on the news), in a hurry. If I do feel myself starting to get worked up, taking a step back and taking a couple deep breaths to clear my head usually gets me back where I need to be.

I fish Ned rigs, DS, Keitechs, grubs, small shakyheads all on a 6' 10" ML/XF LTB with braid. I've used it for wacky rigs with no issues too.

Welcome!

Welcome!

Sounds like I better get back and check again then. There was still a bunch left even after I bought all those because they were still marked their original price.

La Cygne was La Cygne Thursday. WT 49 at the ramp, little high and stained. Missed a couple on a squarebill around the ramp that felt like solid hits but maybe I was running into the carp that seemed to be everywhere! WT was 60 at the outlet and it was ripping! Not many shad it didn't seem like and that resulted in not many fish there. I saw one flathead in the 10-15 pound range get caught and strung up. One guy was armpits deep on the flat catching 6" whites like it was cool. I caught my first bass of the year skipping a Ned under the cables. Missed a fish on a spinnerbait that I got a good look at, wasn't a big loss. Went to the flats and hit some wipers and whites pretty good for a minute before I went to the bluff. Grand total of 2 bites, both from the same fish and I lost it both times. Wasn't a monster but a pretty solid fish that I'd like to have caught. Back to the spot on the flat and caught several more wipers before I tailhooked a carp and spent the next several minutes playing tug-o-war around a laydown, sure I was going to lose my new Warpig. Amazingly, I managed to find the line with my lure retriever and hand line the sewer bass in and retrieve my bait. Had I been closer to the outlet I would have donated it to crowd (13 that I counted). All the commotion wrecked my bite. Tried the outlet again and it was even less productive than the first time (0). I thought I was the only boat on the lake with the rain, cold, and dense fog so I started to run towards the dam, but once I saw 3 other trailers in the parking lot, I decided a high speed collision didn't sound like fun and decided to just fish around the ramp for a minute and go home. Cranking a Rayburn Red 1.5 that Drew painted for me, caught my second and current biggest bass of the year at 4lb 5oz. Decided that was a good ending note and packed it in, but not before Cassidee decided to go swimming, I guess she wasn't soaked enough from the rain.

We'll probably go, even though it's a disappointment every year. Wouldn't mind being there to listen to The Ned talk.

Mondo Tackle in Olathe is great. If he doesn't carry something but it's a brand that he carries, Raymond will order it for you. Lots of stuff you won't find in any other stores in the area too. He'll almost always work out a deal with you too.

I think some of my friends think I'm crazy telling them to turn their fish in or out a certain direction when I'm taking a picture of them. Then they see the results and realize why I do it. Getting the fish turned full on to the camera makes a huge difference in capturing the true size of a fish.

Most of what I fish is stained water. I use the same baits that I do in clear water. Baitfish don't become brighter or noisier in stained water than they are in clear water.

That's the big thing with Academy. They'll often have bunches of stuff on sale or clearance that isn't advertised anywhere. I bought them out of almost all their Owner and Gamakatsu hooks that were marked $.48-$.98 a pack a month or so ago. Wasn't advertised anywhere, just stopped in and found them on sale and no way I'm leaving something like quality hooks that I know I'll use for less than a buck a pack. Mcsticks were also on sale but for $7 a bait, still a good enough deal that I bought over a dozen.

Just like other baits, I prefer the more subtle baits that can be fished slower in the winter months. The rest of the year, as much as I hate this phrase, you have to let the fish tell you what they want. Sometimes the aggressive, obnoxious baits will get the strikes, sometimes it's the subtle and very lifelike that trigger them.

I've had good success with all the baits you mentioned except for the Shadow Rap and Strike King 300. They worked as advertised, just didn't catch any fish for me. Having to tinker with your baits is the name of the game when it comes to suspending jerkbaits. I like to modify my baits though so it doesn't bother me at all and jerkbaits are one of my favorite baits to fish.